Recently retired from law after an impressive 50 years in the profession, Culpeper native son John Jenkyn “Butch” Davies III, 76, laughed, flashing his signature smile, when asked if he always wanted to be an attorney.
The former state delegate, a Democrat, launched into a story, highlighting his more than half-century of knowing how to communicate with people from all walks of life. His career, in addition to politics in a mostly Republican area, has spanned community service — apolitical values he saw modeled at home.
As for his choice of profession, “It was during the Vietnam era and when I was at Randolph-Macon in college they did away with deferments except for law school, medical school, dental school, etc., and I sure as hell wasn’t going to be a doctor so I decided to apply for law school,” he said in a recent interview.
The decision gave him a temporary deferment until his draft number came up and Davies got taken out of his first year in law school and sent to the U.S. Army. It was the early 1970s.
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“My lottery number was 44, drafted … I got called up on Dec. 7, Pearl Harbor Day,” Davies recalled. “You know Radar from MASH? I was a Radar, a company clerk, and you just fit into a niche.”
He over-excelled at clerk school in Fort Jackson, South Carolina, finishing an eight-week class in three days, passing the test and getting the company books in order over a weekend when he first arrived. His skill worked to his benefit.
“I came down twice on orders to go to Vietnam,” Davies said. “My first sergeant that I clerked for would come in and he would say, ‘You don’t want to go there. Fort Lewis, Washington, is the jumping off point for Vietnam.’ Got orders to Huntsville, Alabama. He said, ‘They are sending you to clerk school there to be a clerk for the judge advocate to handle court martial paperwork — you will be shipped to Vietnam.’ He took care of it, my orders just disappeared.”
The young clerk reported work at 4 a.m. and worked until 6 p.m. Monday-Thursday, he recalled. “Got off weekends, went to Charleston, Savannah. I loved it.”
In the service, he honed his natural communication skills.
“It contributed with how to deal with people. I was a company clerk with a company of one-third whites, one-third Puerto Ricans and one-third Blacks,” Davies said.
He impressed leadership with a system he developed to initiate a general discharge within 10 days, compared to the typical three-month process.
“It’s really good for the military,” Davies said he was told. “I learned how to do the paperwork.”
Spared Vietnam, he served three years stateside as a company clerk before coming back to Virginia with an Army Commendation Medal and finishing his degree in 1973 from University of Richmond School of Law.
Davies interviewed in Richmond and Northern Virginia for law positions. He recalled sitting in a high-rise building in the latter and hearing an agreement had been reached in a case, over the phone. The next day in court, the lawyer claimed an agreement had not been reached, Davies said.
“I sat right there and listened to the discussion and they did reach a settlement, the guy was lying,” he said. “And I said I don’t want to practice law in an area like that so I came back here.”
It was 1973 and Culpeper had two law firms — Fray-Hudson and Button-Slaughter.
“One represented Culpeper National Bank, one represented Second National Bank and I said, there isn’t anybody here that represents the ordinary citizen. So I said ‘I am going to open my own damn office’ and that’s what I did. When I look back on it now, I was crazy as hell, it worked,” Davies said.
He put up a shingle upstairs in a building on Main Street. His longtime partner, Charlie Barrell, who Davies grew up with in Culpeper, joined him the following year and they moved a block over into a first-floor Main Street office.
“One of my first clients was Dr. (Marshall) Gayheart,” Davies said. “He came into see me to fight a right-of-way the town wanted going through Southgate Shopping Center.”
Joe Troilo, a Brandy Station businessman active in the volunteer fire department with his family, was another early client.
“He said, ‘Your grandfather, your grandmother all looked out for me … I’m going to look out for you.’ That’s what allowed me to hire a secretary,” Davies said of getting the business.
The firm moved to its current location, across from the courthouse on West Cameron Street, in 1975. There were different partners through the years, Andy Gayheart, Dale Durrer, later his first legislative aide, Davies mentioned.
It’s Davies, Barrell, Will, Lewellyn & Edwards now, minus the Davies since he retired on Dec. 31.
“Having practiced law for 50 years, I felt like it was time and the fact I was 76, I said I need to stop sometime,” he said.
Davies remembered doing criminal cases when he first started, and he loved the work. He soon learned he could not have a career in politics and defend criminals.
“George Beard was running against me, said, ‘You’re electing someone who is defending an ax murderer.’ I was 29 years old when I first ran, lost by 44 votes,” Davies said.
He grew up in local politics. Davies’ grandmother was the first woman elected to county office — commissioner of the revenue — back in the days when women just didn’t run for political office, he said. His great-grandfather was the first commissioner, his grandfather succeeded him when he died in office until his grandmother took over who then handed it off to Davies’ uncle.
“Her attitude was, you have to be involved in community service,” he said.
Davies remembers learning about segregation from his grandmother while watching Black people being served food at Gayheart’s Drug Store and then having to go outside to eat in the rain.
“I asked her, ‘Why are they doing that? Why can’t they sit down in here?’ And she said that we have segregation and she said, ‘I don’t think it’s right, but that’s what they do.’ I said, ‘That’s not right,’ and she said, ‘Well maybe you will see a change,’” Davies said.
Back then, citizens had to pay a $5 poll tax in order to vote, just enough to keep Blacks from voting, he said. His grandmother would pay the tax for dozens of people.
“She never said anything about it, she just did it so they could vote. She was a free spirit, my sounding board, Mary Bowers Davies, Ruth Lee was my mother,” Davies said.
Asked about his biggest cases over the years, the retired attorney mentioned representing developer Lee Sammis, who wanted to build an office park and racetrack in Brandy Station.
“He had a vision for the future that we’re beginning to see unfold now,” Davies said. “It was way ahead of its time.”
He mentioned his work with Joe Daniel, Connie Kinchloe, then Gov. Mark Warner and local landowners willing to donate property to bring a community college to Culpeper.
“We got Germanna built — that to me was really important, that 100 (donated) acres really gives us an opportunity,” Davies said.
Elected to the statehouse in 1992, he served four terms in Richmond while working as an attorney. He was on the courts committee responsible for nominating local judges, including the late Roger Morton and Juvenile Court Judge Frank Somerville, still on the bench.
And it was through politics that Davies met his wife, Marty Moon. He handled the estate of her then-husband following his tragic death.
“We started seeing each other — I’d invite her to Richmond, she’d invite me to Charlottesville, we spent seven years together and she asked me to get married. I said, ‘Well, yeah we are. Let’s go ahead and get married now,’” Davies said of their Thanksgiving wedding in 1999.
After spending much of his life as a bachelor, what caught his eye?
“One, she was very independent, which I liked,” Davies said. “We enjoyed each other’s company immensely. We were dancing, doing things together, and she was just perfect, she really was.”
The couple still enjoys doing things together, including relaxing trips to their beach house at Hilton Head. Davies still maintains an office on the other side of the wall in the old law office building on West Cameron Street he co-owns.
Here, he can meet with his rental property tenants and pursue other interests, now that he’s retired. They’re also using a room next door where Moon can teach quilting, which she has been doing for years.
Davies recalled zoning cases he represented through the years, the Three Flags development, for example, and the hours-long government meetings where everyone got stirred up.
“When you look back on it — it was fun, a challenge,” he said.
As for community service, Davies has been a vestryman at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church as well as associated with Culpeper Renaissance, Virginia Main Street, Culpeper Dawn Lions, Culpeper County Bar Association and the Germanna Community College Educational Foundation, among others.
He most recently served on the board of Aging Together and, on May 1, will be honored as their Culpeper Five Over 50 Award recipient, recognizing years of giving back.
Asked what he will miss most about being a lawyer, Davies answered easily.
“Being able to help people. I probably represented two dozen nonprofits. It’s how I was raised. I look back on it — my uncle, that’s what he did, my grandmother did that, it was part of your responsibility, so I enjoyed that.”